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Griffin RoadTrip FM Transmitter with SmartScan Review

I was looking for a new cradle and FM transmitter  for my iPhone to use in my Audi A6. I already have a belkin tunebase for my wife’s PT Cruiser which works great in her car. For some reason when I tried in my car it did not work so well, I had a hard time getting good clear sound no matter what station I tuned it to. So I started looking for a different brand for my car and came a cross a deal I could not pass up. It was a Griffin Roadtrip model 4040-RDTRPB for 14.99 on Amazon.com. Ordered it on thursday had it by tues and only paid 4.99 for shipping.

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Iphone 3g tethering with os 3.0 on ATT no jailbreak required

How would you like to be able  to tether your Iphone 3g with out jail-breaking it. Apple has made this possible with the new Iphone 3.0 os. While at&t has not allowed apple to activate tethering yet it is still in the os here is what you need to do.

iPhone 3.0 is live! so we are going to repost our tethering tutorial with some big improvements.  You now don’t have to do any downgrading or torrenting.    Seems you can just run a little command in terminal (Make sure you are on OS 3.0 on a 3G iPhone and iTunes 8.2):

defaults write com.apple.iTunes carrier-testing -bool TRUE

After that, the steps become a lot more simple.

1. Download this file (for AT&T) and mount the disk image (thanks Gizmodo) for other carriers, try here.

2. Option-click on “restore” in your iTunes with your iPhone attached.  Browse to the opened disk image file and hit OK.  It will update phone settings for a few seconds.

3. You have tethering.  Now go into your iPhone/settings/general/network/Internet Tethering and turn it on.

Boom – 3 steps to tethering…

This works perfect on my Iphone 3G.

Dell Mini 9 Review Running OSX 10.5.6

I recently bought a dell mini 9 from the Dell outlet store for 254.00. What did I get for that price, I got a refurbished dell min with a 16 gig ssd, 1 gig of ram and a 1.3 megapixel webcam. I have been looking for a ultra portable and cheap  notebook  that I could use anywhere and not have to worry about it so that left a Macbook out which was my first choice although bigger than I wanted. So I started looking at netbooks which Apple has yet to make

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Buying AppleCare from Ebay. Should you or Shouldn’t you?

Should you buy applecare from ebay or should you just buy it from an official Apple reseller? That is the question I was asking myself last week as my 1 year warranty was coming up on my Mac Pro. I compared prices from apple $249.00 and from other online retailers. Then I checked ebay and I found that I could buy applecare for $92.00 for my Mac Pro, that is a $157.00 savings. I thought wow that is great buy but how can they offer it so low and be legit. I can’t tell you how they can offer it so low but I can tell you that I went ahead and bought it off ebay from

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Update Best skins ever review for iPhone 3g after 6 months

This is an update from my best skins review in August. I have gone through 2 skins on my iphone, each one lasting about 3 months. I will be posting pictures of what it looks like after 3 months of wear and a short video showing how it comes off.

The best skin ever for the iphone  does what it is supposed to do, it has kept my iphone looking like new with out a case.  However,

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Some my favorite free iPhone apps

Here are some of my favorite free apps for the iPhone. What are your favorite free apps.

1. Simplify Media
2. WordPress
3. Box office
4. BJ run lite
5. Twitterrific
6. Facebook
7. Pandora

Belkin F8Z183 Tunebase for iPhone 3g review.

I bought my belkin tunebase threw amazon.com which had a price of 69.99. You need to make sure you get model # F8Z183 it is the only model right now of tunebase that supports the iPhone.  The box comes with instructions , several different ipod adapters from original to the new nano and touch. I found the Iphone adapter to be a bit snug for my 3g iphone, could be because I have a skin on it. I found the orginal ipod adapter to work best for the iphone 3g with my skin on it. You have a couple ways to find a station for the fm transmitter. One is ClearScan all you have to do in press the button and it searches for a clear station. I found it to work pretty well I live in Denver and it did not have a problem finding a usable station. The other option is to find a station that just is static and then manually tune the fm transmitter to that station. The tunebase has two presets to save stations, all you do is press the button and hold till it beeps and the preset are set. It also has a Pro setting that optimizes audio and boosts volume, I found this very handy and really did improve the audio thru the fm transmitter. There are 3 settings and I found that either setting 2 or 3 sounded the best. For an fm transmitter it seems to work really well I have not had to change the station while driving all over town or have had any static. the tune base does a great job holding the iphone in either upright or landscape position. While the tune bas was made for the original iphone it works perfect with the 3g iphone. There are no messages that come like not compatible with this device no need to put it in airplane mode. It charges the phone, plays music threw it, using the ipod function or thru aol radio or Pandora.  The only problem I have found is if you use the iphone as an ipod on the belkin tunebase , when you go and snyc  it with itunes it does not update the play count in itunes. I have tested this by playing a playlist at work putting it in the tunebase on the way but not using the ipod function and when I sync it the play counts up date. Now when I do the same thing but use the ipod function while in the tune dock it does not sync play counts for anything played that day. You can use aol radio or Pandora in the tune dock and will still sync your play count but as soon as you use it as an ipod in the tunebase in seems to erase any playcount info not sure why.

 Overall I very happy with the belkin tunebase it does what I wanted it to do and does it very well. If they could just workout the play count issue it would be perfect. I no longer have to worry about my phone sliding around my car  and makes the gps easy to use while driving .

 

iPhone 3G Connection Issues Related to Software and Hardware.

 Additional sources have corroborated an analyst’s claim that recent iPhone 3G connection issues are the result of issues with the Infineon chipset used to provide 3G connectivity in the iPhone. The sources indicate that Apple plans to address the issue through a software update rather than a hardware recall.

Two sources say Apple will likely issue a software update by the end of September—if not by the end of this month—to resolve the issues. Apple and Infineon are currently testing the fix, which will be included in a broader update of the iPhone’s software.

The exact problem with the Infineon chipset remains the subject of speculation, with one source claiming that the fault rests with the chipset struggling to keep up with the popularity and data consumption of the iPhone 3G. However, additional speculation suggests that Apple has been overly conservative with its software settings for determining whether the 3G signal and bandwidth is sufficient to support 3G functions at any given time.

Part of the role of the Infineon chip is to check whether there’s enough 3G bandwidth available in a given area. If 3G isn’t available or there isn’t enough bandwidth, the iPhone will be shifted to a slower network. One source says Apple programmed the Infineon chip to demand a more powerful 3G signal than the iPhone really requires. So if too many people try to make a call or go on the Internet in a given area, some of the devices will decide there’s insufficient power and switch to the slower network—even if there is enough 3G bandwidth available.

The source claims that this issue primarily arises in areas of high iPhone density such as “the San Francisco Bay area, Boston, and certain overseas locales.”

In contrast, however, an MSNBC.com article cites a report from Ny Teknik, a Swedish technical magazine, claiming that the issues are in fact hardware-related.

The report said the most likely cause of the 3G problems is defective adjustments between the antenna and an amplifier that captures very weak signals from the antenna. This could lead to poor 3G connectivity and slower data speeds.

Apple has not yet acknowledged the existence of 3G connection issues with the new iPhone and declined to comment for either article, leaving the details of the problem and Apple’s plans for addressing it uncertain and subject to speculation for the time being.

Lets hope the they are right an Apple is working on a software fix and lets hope the phones don’t have a problem with the chipset that cannot be fixed by software.

Best skins ever review for iPhone 3g

Best skins ever review for iPhone 3g By Mike Ricci

This is a review of the best skins ever to the iPhone 3g. I ordered the skin on July 24th and received it on July 25th. I ordered 2 back one piece skins which came to $12.00 shipped much cheaper than invisible shield. What comes in the mail is just the skins no solution or card to take out bubbles. Still for the price you can make your own solution out of  10oz of water and a tiny drop of baby soap.

This is the First skin I ever put on and the thought of putting water on my brand new iPhone had me worried. While debating putting on the skin i read thru some forums for other users install tips and to see if any problems arose from getting their device wet. After reading many posts and not seeing any ill effects from putting a skin on I decided give it a shot.

The sheet that comes with the skins points you to the website for install instructions. I followed their instructions mostly. I made a bowl of solution which is made out of 10 oz of water and a tiny drop of soap they say to use baby soap, I used dawn and just a tiny drop. I mixed the soap and water gently and let it sit for about 20 minutes till not bubbles where in the water. While I was waiting I cleaned my iphone with a lint free cloth to make sure there were no finger prints or dirt on the back or on the chrome. I turned off the A/C to help keep the dust down, some people do this in a steamy bathroom I choose not to. Getting very close to the point of no return I washed my hands twice to make sure they were clean. I then dipped my fingers in the solution before trying to take the skin off the backing. The skin really sticks to backing so you need to be-careful  pulling it up not to rip it or get finger prints on it. I kept dipping my fingers in the water to keep them wet while pulling the skin. Once the skin was off I dunked it in the solution and the shook off the excess water i then placed the skin on the iphone ,you need to make sure to remember which side was sticky so you put the right side down. Once on the phone the skin will slide across the back so you can position it, I used the camera hole and the volume and silent switch to line it up. When I had it lined up just right i used the cloth that came with the iphone and pressed down in the center to try and get to stick so it would not move. I continued to use the cloth to try and push out the excess water from under the skin using it like a squeegee , you could used a credit card instead. I tried to push any water down the sides and not near any ports. I did not worry about the edges or corners yet i got the back bubble free and smooth before moving on. Next I worked on the sides lining up the skin on the chrome once that was done i let it sit for about 10 minutes before moving to the corners. The Corners can be hard to stick if they are to wet so it best to let them get a little tacky first. Once it dried some I went to try and put the corners down i used my fingers to lay the corners down in the right spot then I pressed the corner in the palm of my had to get it to stick down and did this with all 4 corners and went very well. In all this took about 1 hour from mixing the solution to being done. I then waited to to the phone back on till the next morning about 12 hrs and when I did all was fine.

So After having this skin on my iPhone here is what I think. To me this is the best $12.00 I have spent on my Iphone. I do not like cases covering up my iphone but i want it protected and this works perfectly. I am no longer worried about setting my phone down or putting it in my pocket. The skin has tacky feel to it so gives the phone a better grip but looking at it you can barley tell has a skin on it . I did not put the front skin on for 2 reasons one I did not think I would like the tackiness feeling one the touch screen and two I prefer antiglare screen protectors . I give this skin a 10 out of 10 for ease of install and fast shipping and for protecting my phone. If you are thinking about putting skin on your phone I say don’t worry and just take your time it will come out fine. If you have any questions about install feel free to ask I will be happy to answer them.

Tips

• Don’t spray the skin with the solution dunk it instead
• Let the corners dry before trying to get them to stick
• Place a lint free cloth down to pick up any water the comes off the phone
• Don’t use paper towels
• Set aside time to do this don’t rush

Pictures